Article April 23, 1910 Issue

THE FOURTH BEATITUDE

ANNE EVANS.

Jesus said, in that wonderful hillside sermon: "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled." When urgent need drove me to take up the study of the Christian Science text-book, in the hope of proving for myself some of the truth it voices, such a wealth of light and comfort was opened to my sorely tried mind and heart that I could scarcely bear to lay the book down. When I did, and the mortal picture of the problem then confronting me presented itself, it caused me such grief and anxiety that perforce I sought the book again. From it, I learned to turn my mind from the limited mortal view of the situation, and to seek that brighter world which Christian Science teaches us to find and to demonstrate. So, in trains, street-cars, and subways, by day and by night, I read Mrs. Eddy's book, and I found in it not only peace for my weary mind and heart, but a sure and simple way, which any child could follow, through the trials I had not dared to contemplate.

I know that my experience has not been in the least unique. Since then, again and again, I have known people who, in periods of mental, physical, or spiritual extremity, have turned to the text-book of Christian Science, and in their hunger and thirst after the bread and wine of spiritual sustenance it offers, have shut out every other thought, and given to that book their constant attention; and never once have I known them to lay it down, unrefreshed and unanswered in thought. If the study has been sufficiently humble and unprejudiced, the problem will have been lifted out of the atmosphere of an earthly need into that of an heavenly opportunity. Perhaps the help of a practitioner has been required in order to bring out the physical healing, but the student can see for himself the Principle and its rule of operation, and can by his own mental work help to bring about an harmonious condition in his own affairs. He need never again be the victim of a sense of helplessness.

I think that every earnest seeker for the way in Christian Science finds, in the first year or more of his study, that he has little time to read any other books save the Bible and our text-book, which is indeed its "Key,"—that other books fail to hold his interest, and that to read them seems like wasting precious minutes that might be invested in brinking the draughts of pure truth. The treadmill of "work to eat, eat to live, live to work," becomes glorified with the consciousness that every waking hour may be filled with thoughts of truth. No moment, no task can be dull or monotonous, and no work done under the beneficent influence of Christian Science can suffer from thoughts filled with truth. An hour spent in waiting, once looked upon as wasted, becomes the most productive of the day; and every incident of the busiest life comes to the Christian Scientist with its power to bless or its need to be blessed. It is our privilege to help, or to be helped by, each thought which presents itself to our consciousness, if we will watch our own thought concerning it, declaring faithfully the truth about it and contradicting the error.

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